Homily for the 5th Sunday of Lent, A

(The Homily begins at minute 6:40) Jesus is experiencing something like a Gethsemane, for he knows that calling Lazarus out of the tomb means that he must enter it. In fact, the belief in Jesus, generated by his raising Lazarus, prompts the religious leaders to plot Jesus’ death. 

I have Mass on Sunday, March 22 at St. Isidore @ 9:30/11:30 am

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Transcript

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to John. 

Now a man was ill, Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfumed oil and dried his feet. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfumed oil and dried his feet with her hair. It was her brother Lazarus who was ill. So the sisters sent word to him, saying, Master, the one you love is ill. When Jesus heard this, he said, This illness is not to end in death, but is for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified through it. Now, Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that he was ill, he remained for two days in the place where he was. Then after this, he said to his disciples, let us go back to Judea. The disciples said to him, Rabbi, the Jews were just trying to stone you, and you want to go back there? Jesus answered, are there not twelve hours in a day? If one walks during the day, he does not stumble. because he sees the light of this world. But if one walks at night, he stumbles because the light is not in him. He said this and then told them, Our friend Lazarus is asleep, but I am going to awaken him. So the disciples said to him, Master, if he is asleep, he will be saved. But Jesus was talking about his death while they thought he meant ordinary sleep. So then Jesus said to them clearly, Lazarus has died, and I'm glad for you that I was not there, that you may believe. Let us go to him. So Thomas, called Didymus, said to his fellow disciples, let us also go to die with him. 

When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, only about two miles away, and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them about their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him, but Mary sat at home. Martha said to Jesus, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you. Jesus said to her, your brother will rise. Martha said to him, I know he will rise in the resurrection on the last day. Jesus told her, I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live. And everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this? She said to him, yes, Lord, I've come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was coming into the world. 

When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, secretly saying, The teacher is here and is asking for you. As soon as she heard this, she rose quickly and went to him. For Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still where Martha had met him. So when the Jews who were with her in the house comforting her saw Mary get up quickly and go out, they followed her, presuming that she was going to the tomb to weep there. When Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said to him, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her weeping, he became perturbed and deeply troubled and said, Where have you laid him? They said to him, Sir, come and see. And Jesus wept. So the Jews said, See how he loved him. But some of them said, Could not the one who opened the eyes of the blind man have done something so that this man would not have died. 

So Jesus, perturbed again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay across it. Jesus said, Take away the stone. Martha, the dead man's sister, said to him, Lord, by now there will be a stench. He has been dead for four days. Jesus said to her, Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God? So they took away the stone. And Jesus raised his eyes and said, Father, I thank you for hearing me. I know that you always hear me. But because of the crowd here, I have said this, that they may believe that you sent me. And when he had said this, he cried out in a loud voice, Lazarus, come out. The dead man came out, tied hand and foot with burial bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth. So Jesus said to them, untie him and let him go. Now many of the Jews who had come to Mary and had seen what he had done, began to believe in him. 

The Gospel of the Lord 

On one level, this gospel is about the death and resurrection of Lazarus, but on another level, it is about the death and resurrection of Jesus. With these two meanings in mind, the passion of Jesus bleeds through the surface of the story. Jesus was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. And he was deeply moved again, and he wept. 

Why? Jesus had deliberately delayed coming until Lazarus was dead and buried. The crowd said, see how he loved him. But in this gospel especially, the crowd never really understands what is going on. Jesus is experiencing something like a Gethsemane, for he knows that calling Lazarus out of the tomb means that he must enter it. In fact, the belief in Jesus generated by the raising of Lazarus prompts the religious leaders to plot Jesus' death. But for Jesus, there is no other way, because only in this act can he be the resurrection and the life for the world. 

In and through the Lazarus story, the reader sees the Jesus story. Just before Jesus begins to weep, he asks, Where have you laid him? They reply, Lord, come and see. In John's Gospel, these words, come and see, issue a call to discipleship. They are spoken by Jesus to his first disciples when they ask where he is staying. Come and see. They are spoken by Philip to Nathanael when he asks if anything good might come out of Nazareth. Come and see. They are spoken by the woman from Samaria with whom Jesus spoke at the well as she told her neighbors of her encounter with him. Come and see. These words are an invitation to follow. And for Jesus, they are an invitation to follow Lazarus into the tomb. The seeds for Good Friday are sown at the tomb of Lazarus. Jesus has to occupy death itself in order to bring God's glory into the place of death. 

This is Jesus' core identity. I am the resurrection and the life, Jesus says. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this? The whole point of John's Gospel is this living faith. In chapter 1 of John's Gospel, which we read on Christmas morning, John declares, To believe in John's Gospel is always tied to Jesus. And in John's Gospel, it always appears as a verb, not as a noun. Faith is something you do. More to the point, faith is something you live. 

When paul speaks of flesh and spirit he's describing two ways of organizing a life. Life according to the flesh is life built around self-protection. It assumes scarcity. Life begins to close in on itself. Paul says the mind set on the flesh leads to death, but not only the death that comes at the end of life, the kind that creeps in long before that. 

But there's another way of being alive. The mind set on the Spirit is life and peace. The Spirit does not remove us from our lives. The Spirit changes the kind of life that is growing within us. In baptism, we died with Christ and were buried together with Him. We're already living the resurrection. If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, Paul writes, The one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit dwelling in you. The same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead has taken up residence in ordinary human lives. 

The real issue of faith is not so much believing in God and in the resurrection of the body after death, but in believing in the possibilities of God bringing about resurrection and newness into our lives right now. In order to experience new life, we have to allow ourselves to be called forth from the tomb. Jesus' words are the same creative word God spoke in the beginning. Let there be. Come out. and there was life. Lazarus responds to the words while he was still a dead man. Even in death, he heard the voice of God calling him back to life. Unbind him and let him go. Only when we can let go of all that holds us bound will we be free to live abundant life. There can be no resurrection as long as we are in control, holding on for dear life. 

Frederick Buechner writes, 
When Lazarus opened his eyes to see the figure of Jesus standing there in the daylight, he couldn't tell for the life of him which side he was on.